BCCH carrier of non-constant power and corresponding method of measuring the signal level received by a mobile station on a carrier of this kind

A BCCH carrier transmitted by a base station of a digital cellular mobile radio system to a plurality of mobile stations,

• said BCCH carrier being segmented temporally into successive frames of fixed duration, each of said frames being divided into a particular number NIT of time slots,
• said BCCH carrier supporting a physical BCCH that carries at least one logical BCCH that transmits general signaling information known as BCCH information,
• each mobile station, for which the base station transmitting said BCCH carrier is an adjoining base station, having at least one monitoring window in each of at least NT successive frames, where NT≧1 such that at least NF successive monitoring windows for receiving said BCCH carrier, each monitoring window enabling the mobile station concerned to receive at least NE time slots of said BCCR carrier, where NF≧1,
• wherein said BCCH carrier supports at least NR physical BCCH transmitted at constant power and consisting in the recurrence in each frame of NR time slots known as BCCH time slots,
• said physical BCCH or each of said NR physical BCCH carries at least said logical BCCH, said BCCH time slot or each of said NR BCCH time slots containing said BCCH information at least once in NT successive frames, the number and the spacing of said NR BCCH time slot or time slots are such that said BCCH information is entirely received in said monitoring window or one of said at least NF successive monitoring windows of each mobile station, and said time slots other than said NR BCCH time slots are transmitted with a power that can be controlled,
• wherein NR=INT[NIT/NE] and INT[X] is the integer greater than or equal to X.

A BCCH carrier transmitted by a base station of a digital cellular mobile radio system to a plurality of mobile stations,

• said BCCH carrier being segmented temporally into successive frames of fixed duration, each of said frames being divided into a particular number NIT of time slots,
• said BCCH carrier supporting a physical BCCH that carries at least one logical BCCH that transmits general signaling information known as BCCH information,
• each mobile station, for which the base station transmitting said BCCH carrier is an adjoining base station, having at least one monitoring window in each of at least NT successive frames, where NT≧1 such that at least NF successive monitoring windows for receiving said BCCH carrier, each monitoring window enabling the mobile station concerned to receive at least NE time slots of said BCCH carrier, where NE≧1,
• wherein said BCCH carrier supports at least NR physical BCCH transmitted at constant power and consisting in the recurrence in each frame of NR time slots known as BCCH time slots,
• said physical BCCH or each of said NR physical BCCH carries at least said logical BCCH, said BCCH time slot or each of said NR BCCH time slots containing said BCCH information at least once in NT successive frames, the number and the spacing of said NR BCCH time slot or time slots are such that said BCCH information is entirely received in said monitoring window or one of said at least NF successive monitoring windows of each mobile station, and said time slots other than said NR BCCH time slots are transmitted with a power that can be controlled,
• wherein, when NR≧2, said NR BCCH time slots are equally divided within the frame structure.

A BCCH carrier transmitted by a base station of a digital cellular mobile radio system to a plurality of mobile stations,

• said BCCH carrier being segmented temporally into successive frames of fixed duration, each of said frames being divided into a particular number NIT of time slots,
• said BCCH carrier supporting a physical BCCH that carries at least one logical BCCH that transmits general signaling information known as BCCH information,
• each mobile station, for which the base station transmitting said BCCH carrier is an adjoining base station, having at least one monitoring window in each of at least NT successive frames, where NT≧1 such that at least NF successive monitoring windows for receiving said BCCH carrier, each monitoring window enabling the mobile station concerned to receive at least NE time slots of said BCCR carrier, where NE≧1,
• wherein said BCCH carrier supports at least NR physical BCCH transmitted at constant power and consisting in the recurrence in each frame of NR time slots known as BCCH time slots,
• said physical BCCH or each of said NR physical BCCH carries at least said logical BCCH, said BCCH time slot or each of said NR BCCH time slots containing said BCCH information at least once in NT successive frames, the number and the spacing of said NR BCCH time slot or time slots are such that said BCCH information is entirely received in said monitoring window or one of said at least NF successive monitoring windows of each mobile station, and time slots other than said NR BCCH time slots are transmitted with a power that can be controlled,
• wherein a method of measuring the signal level received on said BCCH carrier by said mobile station comprises:
• dividing said monitoring window or each of said NF successive monitoring windows into a plurality of time portions so that, on receiving said BCCH carrier, at least one of said time portions contains only a part of said BCCH time slot, or one of said NR BCCH time slots,
• measuring the received signal level in each time portion of each of said NF successive monitoring windows, and
• comparing the measured received signal levels in order to detect the maximum received signal level, which constitutes said signal level received on said BCCH carrier.